The Lenape Stone is a slate found in two pieces in Bucks County, Pennsylvania in 1872, which appears to depict Native Americans hunting a woolly mammoth. The image seems to have been carved some time after the stone was broken into two; for this and other reasons, it is generally considered an archaeological forgery.
The first portion of the stone is reported to have been found in Mechanicsville, Bucks County by Bernard Hansell, a farmer, in the spring of 1872. In 1881, Hansell sold the fragment to Henry Paxson, a young man with an interest in Native American artifacts. A few months later, Hansell reported finding the second piece of the stone in the same field where he had unearthed the first.
Once the two pieces were joined, they were examined by members of the Bucks County Historical Society, including archaeologist and historian Henry Chapman Mercer. Despite evidence which cast doubt on the stone's origin, Mercer came to be an ardent proponent of its authenticity, an argument which he put forth in his 1885 book, The Lenape Stone, or the Indian and the Mammoth. However, even Mercer acknowledged that the stone's unique nature and a lack of physical evidence (such as soil samples) made scientific certainty impossible.
The Lenape Stone was acquired by the Mercer Museum in 1934 for $600. [1] In 1967 the stone was stolen from the museum and was missing for two years. [2] It was recovered in 1969 during an undercover investigation in Philadelphia. [3]
The stone is still housed at the Mercer Museum in Doylestown, Pennsylvania.
The Lenape Stone is a small piece of slate, 4 ⅜ by 1 ¾ inches, ½ inch thick and 2 inches wide. It is hypothesised to have been a gorget, a type of ornamental necklace. Supporting this theory are the two holes drilled into the stone which would have enabled it to be worn about the neck. The stone comprises two fragments, each of which is decorated with clear engravings on both sides; they form a complete picture when the two halves are joined. On one side there are numerous depictions of turtles, fish, birds, and snakes. The reverse side shows an elephant-like creature, apparently a mammoth, along with humanoid figures, a forest, some teepees, and other markings. The humanoid figures are engaged in battle with the mammoth, and one even appears to have been trampled by it.
Henry Mercer purported the Lenape Stone was authentic. The stone was a significant find at the time, being supposedly the first ancient illustration of a mammoth in America. [4] Mercer went to great lengths detailing his analysis in his 1885 book, The Lenape Stone, or the Indian and the Mammoth, which he personally paid to have published. He conducted an archaeological dig on the Hansell Farm, collected testimony, documented contemporary expert opinions (including contemporary Indians and scholars who disagreed with his own conclusion), and researched related findings and Native American mythology. [5] Mercer theorized that the back side of the stone, with the various animal depictions, could have been a pictographic or mnemonic device depicting an oral history or "song-chronicle" of Indian history. [5] He compared the pictographs with that of the Walam Olum , which Mercer believed to be the genuine Lenape origin story.
Kenneth Feder notes that mammoths became extinct in North America around 10,000 years ago, while most gorgets uncovered in archaeological digs are less than 2,000 years old. In addition, other artifacts found in the same farm as the Lenape Stone bore stylistically similar carvings, and these were all dated to around 2,000 years ago. After the slate was found it was cleaned multiple times, destroying evidence of erosion or wear. The carvings on each half of the stone appear not to match up perfectly, which may indicate that they were made after the stone was broken. Feder concluded that the stone "was obviously a fake" and was possibly created by whoever made it in order to sell it. [6]
Herbert C. Kraft, an archaeologist and leading scholar on Lenape History from the 1960s to the 1990s, concluded the Lenape Stone is a fake. While gorget stones were used from 1000 BC to 1000 AD, few are incised with figures. The bow and arrow shown on the stone was not in use by Paleo-Indian mastodon or mammoth hunters. Teepees, as depicted on the stone, were not known to be used by Native Americans in the East. [4]
Bernard Hansell, the alleged finder of the Lenape Stone, claimed to have discovered three more similar stones in 1885, while Mercer was writing his book. Mercer documented these finds in his book and believed this bolstered the authenticity of the Lenape Stone, while others believe these were more of Hansell's frauds. [4] [5] [7]
The Hammond Tablet, also known as the Hammond Stone or Taunton Stone, bears a strikingly similar resemblance to the Lenape Stone. It was a gorget stone found in 1917 near Taunton, Massachusetts about five miles upstream from Dighton Rock, known for its mysterious petroglyphs. Frank C. Hammond, a local railroad engineer and artifact collector, uncovered the stone while he was plowing on his farm. [8] The stone was made of dark slate like the Lenape Stone, although it was bigger at 12 inches long, 6 inches wide, and 1/2 inches thick. It was in the shape of an animal pelt and each side depicted scenes very similar to the Lenape Stone. It had four holes while the Lenape Stone only has two.
The whereabouts of the Hammond Tablet are unknown, but pictures and tracings of the stone made by Professor Edmund Burke Delabarre are stored at the Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology at Harvard University. An article in the Boston Post from 1921 chronicled multiple experts who had varying theories, ranging from the stone being authentic to a fraud perpetrated by Mormons. [8] In the 1920s, Professor Delabarre and C. C. Willoughby, Director of the Peabody Museum at Harvard, both argued the Hammond Tablet was most likely a deliberate fake. [9] Willoughby theorizes both stones were possibly made by the same person or at the same time. However, one must note that the Hammond Tablet was found 50 years after the Lenape Stone and they were found over 250 miles apart. In the 1990s, Lenape historian Herbert C. Kraft argued the Hammond Tablet was "plagiarized from the equally fake Lenape Stone." [4] In 2001 he wrote the Hammond Tablet was most likely copied from Mercer's illustrations of the Lenape Stone. [10]
The Dighton Rock is a 40-ton boulder, originally located in the riverbed of the Taunton River at Berkley, Massachusetts. The rock is noted for its petroglyphs, carved designs of ancient and uncertain origin, and the controversy about their creators. In 1963, during construction of a coffer dam, state officials removed the rock from the river for preservation. It was installed in a museum in a nearby park, Dighton Rock State Park. In 1971, it was listed on the National Register of Historic Places (NRHP).
The Los Lunas Decalogue Stone is a hoax associated with a large boulder on the side of Hidden Mountain, near Los Lunas, New Mexico, about 35 miles (56 km) south of Albuquerque, that bears a nine-line inscription carved into a flat panel. The stone is also known as the Los Lunas Mystery Stone or Commandment Rock. The stone has gained notoriety in that some claim the inscription is Pre-Columbian, and therefore proof of early Semitic contact with the Americas. Standard archeological evidence contradicts this, however.
Henry Chapman Mercer was an American archeologist, artifact collector, tile-maker, and designer of three distinctive poured concrete structures: Fonthill, his home; the Moravian Pottery and Tile Works; and the Mercer Museum.
Archaeological forgery is the manufacture of supposedly ancient items that are sold to the antiquities market and may even end up in the collections of museums. It is related to art forgery.
Many pre-Columbian cultures in North America were collectively termed "Mound Builders", but the term has no formal meaning. It does not refer to specific people or archaeological culture but refers to the characteristic mound earthworks that indigenous peoples erected for an extended period of more than 5,000 years. The "Mound Builder" cultures span the period of roughly 3500 BCE to the 16th century CE, including the Archaic period, Woodland period, and Mississippian period. Geographically, the cultures were present in the region of the Great Lakes, the Ohio River Valley, Florida, and the Mississippi River Valley and its tributary waters.
The Adena culture was a Pre-Columbian Native American culture that existed from 500 BCE to 100 CE, in a time known as the Early Woodland period. The Adena culture refers to what were probably a number of related Native American societies sharing a burial complex and ceremonial system. The Adena culture was centered on the location of the modern state of Ohio, but also extended into contiguous areas of northern Kentucky, eastern Indiana, West Virginia, and parts of extreme western Pennsylvania.
The Ica stones are a collection of andesite stones from the Ica Province in Peru, known for their engraved motifs. Largely regarded to be modern hoaxes, the stones in some cases utilize art styles from various pre-Columbian Peruvian civilizations and often depict anachronistic scenes or objects, including dinosaurs and advanced technology.
The Walam Olum, Walum Olum or Wallam Olum, usually translated as "Red Record" or "Red Score", is purportedly a historical narrative of the Lenape (Delaware) Native American tribe. The document has provoked controversy as to its authenticity since its publication in the 1830s by botanist and antiquarian Constantine Samuel Rafinesque. Ethnographic studies in the 1980s and analysis in the 1990s of Rafinesque's manuscripts have produced significant evidence that the document may be a hoax.
The Davenport Tablets are three inscribed slate tablets found in mounds near Davenport, Iowa on January 10, 1877, and January 30, 1878. If these tablets were real, they would have been proof for the argument that the people who built the Native American mounds, called the Mound Builders were built by an ancient race of settlers. The Davenport Tablets were originally considered authentic, though opinion shifted after 1885 and they are now considered a hoax.
The Newark Holy Stones refer to a set of artifacts allegedly discovered by David Wyrick in 1860 within a cluster of ancient Indian burial mounds near Newark, Ohio, now believed to be a hoax. The set consists of the Keystone, a stone bowl, and the Decalogue with its sandstone box. They can be viewed at the Johnson-Humrickhouse Museum in Coshocton, Ohio. The site where the objects were found is known as the Newark Earthworks, one of the biggest collections from an ancient American Indian culture known as the Hopewell that existed from approximately 100 BC to AD 500.
The Bat Creek inscription is an inscribed stone tablet found by John W. Emmert on February 14, 1889. Emmert claimed to have found the tablet in Tipton Mound 3 during an excavation of Hopewell mounds in Loudon County, Tennessee. This excavation was part of a larger series of excavations that aimed to clarify the controversy regarding who is responsible for building the various mounds found in the Eastern United States.
Herbert Clemens Kraft (1927–2000) was an archaeologist from New Jersey, specializing in prehistory. He wrote numerous books about archaeology in New Jersey, the Lenape and the Paleo-indians of New Jersey, as well as over 170 articles in his career.
Nora Thompson Dean, also known as Weenjipahkihelexkwe, which translates as "Touching Leaves Woman" in Unami, was a member of the Delaware Tribe of Indians. As a Lenape traditionalist and one of the last fluent speakers of the southern Unami dialect of the Lenape language, she was an influential mentor to younger tribal members and is widely cited in scholarship on Lenape culture.
Shell gorgets are a Native American art form of polished, carved shell pendants worn around the neck. The gorgets are frequently engraved, and are sometimes highlighted with pigments, or fenestrated.
The Holly Oak Gorget or Holly Oak Pendant is an artifact made from a section of shell that is engraved with the image of an extinct woolly mammoth reportedly found in Holly Oak, Delaware and initially identified as an example of Paleoindian art. Purported to have been a gorget carved during the Pleistocene, this object is now widely believed to be an archaeological forgery.
The Castalian Springs Mound State Historic Site (40SU14) is a Mississippian culture archaeological site located near the small unincorporated community of Castalian Springs in Sumner County, Tennessee. The site was first excavated in the 1890s and again as recently as the 2005 to 2011 archaeological field school led by Dr. Kevin E. Smith. A number of important finds have been associated with the site, most particularly several examples of Mississippian stone statuary and the Castalian Springs shell gorget held by the National Museum of the American Indian. The site is owned by the State of Tennessee and is a State Historic Site managed by the Bledsoe's Lick Association for the Tennessee Historical Commission. The site is not currently open to the public.
The Etowah plates, including the Rogan Plates, are a collection of Mississippian copper plates discovered in Mound C at the Etowah Indian Mounds near Cartersville, Georgia. Many of the plates display iconography that archaeologists have classified as part of the Southeastern Ceremonial Complex (S.E.C.C.), specifically "Birdman" imagery associated with warriors and the priestly elite. The plates are a combination of foreign imports and local items manufactured in emulation of the imported style. The designs of the Rogan plates are in the Classic Braden style from the American Bottom area. It is generally thought that some of the plates were manufactured at Cahokia before ending up at sites in the Southeast.
Mississippian copper plates, or plaques, are plain and repousséd plates of beaten copper crafted by peoples of the various regional expressions of the Mississippian culture between 800 and 1600 CE. They have been found as artifacts in archaeological sites in the American Midwest and Southeast. The plates, found as far afield as Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Mississippi, Oklahoma, Tennessee, and Wisconsin, were instrumental in the development of the archaeological concept known as the Southeastern Ceremonial Complex. Some of the more notable examples are representations of raptorial birds and avian-themed dancing warriors.
Burrows Cave is the name given to an alleged cave site in Southern Illinois reputedly discovered by Russell E. Burrows in 1982. Burrows says it contained a number of ancient artifacts. Through the many inconsistencies of Russell E. Burrows' story, discovery and findings, the cave is considered a hoax by archaeologists and anthropologists.
Lenape canoes were dugout canoes of Lenapehoking. Tree trunks used were primarily of the American tulip tree, and also of elm, white oak, chestnut or red cedar. Birch bark canoes were not used in the region.